How the European Alliance Helped Cause World War 1

Historians have spent many years analyzing the origins of World War 1. Many factors are considered by historians when asked this question; nationalism, imperialism, militarism, etc. However all of these factors are influenced and tied together by the alliance system in place at the time tensions in the Balkans erupted. In this time period the Ottoman Empire had lost much of its control and power in the corridor to Europe. Many of the leading nations of Europe sought to emplace their influence in this region to serve as an economical attributor to its powerbase. With land being the primary means of travel between the East and West, having control of the corridor would be extremely favorable for any leading power to impose taxes, control the flow of goods, and serve as a barrier against future invaders.
Before 1914 the five Great Powers; Great Britain, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary and Russia controlled Europe. In order to avoid conflict early on, the major powers went through great lengths to maintain a balance of power constructed from a complex network of political and military alliances throughout the continent. Germany was the chief orchestrator of these alliances when is first made a secret alliance with Austria-Hungary in 1879 (Duffy, "The Causes of World War One"). Three years later Italy joined this “Dual Alliance” to form the Triple Alliance because it was annoyed with France for stopping its plans to colonize North Africa. In 1870 Germany’s industrial and economic power had grown greatly after the unification and the foundation of an empire built from the Old Prussian Empire. Tucker and Wheeler provide excellent details of how Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck, who successfully united Germany, carefully and tactfully, planned treaties with the other Great Powers. Strategically, for the sake the…...

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...World war one sparked with the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and his wife, Sophie. Ferdinand was heir to the Austria-Hungary throne. The killer, a nineteen-years-old Bosnian Serb, Gavrilo Princip, was part of a Serbian terrorist group called “Young Bosnians”, in association with the “Black Hand”, a Serbian government terrorist movement. Few people foresaw that a cataclysmic world war would soon follow. After the assassination, Germany encouraged Austria-Hungary not to deal with the Serbs, but to crush them once and for all. (Serbia and Austria-Hungary had a past with a lot of tensions.) Germany guaranteed full military support, which is called a “blank check”. Sure of the German support, Austria-Hungary issued an Ultimatum of 48 hours to Serbia, who did not accept every demand. This became the excuse for a war that would plunge Europe into darkness. In less than five weeks, a full-scale war broke out, caused by a domino effect and the mobilizations ways. Every country could move their army in a matter of hours and days, given the speed that railroads made possible.
The domino effect first started when Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia in attempt to solve its problems in the Balkans, and Germany encouraged this aggression as part of their own personal plan to control Central Europe. Russia mobilized to support its ally Serbia and extend its own influence. France mobilized to fulfill the terms of its alliance with Russia and get revenged on...

...The Americans were more responsible in terms of their attitudes in 1945 for creating the Cold war. As we can see the USSR and the United States, both had different ideologies and points of view which set the base for confrontation after the Second World War.
The soviet attitudes were straight-forward. Stalin´s main aim was to safeguard and rebuild the Soviet Union. However, his actions created hostility over the West. His foreign policy was based on taking advantage of the military situation in Europe to strengthen the Soviet influence and prevent another invasion from the west. To the nations of the west this was seen as evidence of the expansionist nature of communism, but Soviet aims were based on attitudes that were more complicated than this.
Russia had been invaded from the west 3 times in the 20th century; by Germany in WWI, by those helping the whites during the russian civil war, and by Germany again in WWII. Each time russian loses had been substantial, but the sacrifice required during the WWII was unprecedented. The need to ensure such a devastating war was was not again inflicted upon the Soviet Union was undoubtedly a weighty and pressing concern. The situation in Europe in 1945 provided Stalin with an opportunity to establish a buffer zone of Soviet-influenced states in Eastern Europe, which would act as a barrier against further invasion of the USSR from the West.
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...Causes and Effects of World War 1
World War 1 also known a the First World War or the War to End all Wars, was a world conflict lasting from 1914 to 1919 with the fighting lasting until1918. The war was fought by the Allies on one side, and the Central Powers on the other. No previous conflict had mobilised so many soldiers or involved so many in the field of battle. By its end, the war had become the second bloodiest conflict in recorded history. More than 9 million people died on the battlefield, and nearly that many more on the home fronts because of food shortages, genocide and ground combat.
To set the stage for World War 1, many countries had agreed to alliances between the years of 1879 and 1914. First, Germany and Austria-Hungary made an alliance designed to protect themselves from Russia in 1879, then Austria-Hungary with Serbia and Germany, Britain with Russia and Russia with France.
So by the time World War 1 started most of the European countries were sworn to fight for each-other and as a result, all of them had to take part in the war.
As a consequence of imperialism, countries were becoming increasingly effective in acquiring materials, processing them, and selling them as goods. For this reason, many countries, especially in Europe need more land from which they can gain resources.
Another aspect causing World War 1-militarism. Due to the earlier mentioned alliances, European countries felt that they need better military and battlefield, as a......

...World War One saw the beginning of a new era in warfare. It put an end to static war and created mobile warfare. It also was the beginning of the concept of total war as battles began to be fought in civilian areas and an entire nation’s economy had to be dedicated to winning the war. World War one turned into a bloody stalemate because of trench warfare and the large amounts of soldiers needed to break the defence ratio but in an attempt to break the stalemate the many nations fighting invented various technologies such as the tank, flamethrower, and poisonous gasses to bring about a faster end to the Great War.
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...Top 5 Causes of World War 1
By Martin Kelly
World War 1 is actually much more complicated than a simple list of causes. While there was a chain of events that directly led to the fighting, the actual root causes are much deeper and part of continued debate and discussion. This list is an overview of the most popular reasons that are cited as the root causes of World War 1.
1. Mutual Defense Alliances
Over time, countries throughout Europe made mutual defense agreements that would pull them into battle. Thus, if one country was attacked, allied countries were bound to defend them. Before World War 1, the following alliances existed:
Russia and Serbia
Germany and Austria-Hungary
France and Russia
Britain and France and Belgium
Japan and Britain
Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia got involved to defend Serbia. Germany seeing Russia mobilizing, declared war on Russia. France was then drawn in against Germany and Austria-Hungary. Germany attacked France through Belgium pulling Britain into war.
Then Japan entered the war. Later, Italy and the United States would enter on the side of the allies.
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2. Imperialism
Imperialism is......

...The causes of the FIRST WORLD WAR
1_ The assassination at Sarajevo. (political murder)
On 28th June Franz Ferdinand and his wife visited the Town of Sarajevo. The Archduke was the heir to the throne of the Empire of Austria-Hungary. As the car passed along the street, someone threw a bomb at it. The bomb bounced off the back of the car and exploded, injuring an officer in the car behind. The Archduke and his wife were unhurt. Later that day the Archduke said that he wanted to change his plans and visit the injured officer in hospital. He set off again by car, but the driver was not told the route had change. Some minutes later a man called Gavrilo Princip shot them and died.
2_ The great powers in 1914.
If see the map the six most important and powerful countries in Europe were split into two armed groups.
The triple Alliance. Central powers.
Germany: was made up of many small states that had united and become one country only as recently as 1871. Otto von Bismarck, who was the Chancelor of the newly united Germany, firmly believed that all questions of the day could be solved by military strength by blood and iron. The stong national feeling in Germany and its wealth from industry made the Germans keen to play a leading part in world affairs. Kaiser Wilhelm II was impatient to make Germany the leading country in Europe.
Austria-Hungary: the empire of Austria-Hungary was Germany´s oldest ally. German was the language of Government, but each group spoke its own......

...About World War I
"Total War I: The Great War"
by John Bourne
The First World War was truly ‘the Great War’. Its origins were complex. Its scale was vast. Its conduct was intense. Its impact on military operations was revolutionary. Its human and material costs were enormous. And its results were profound.
The war was a global conflict. Thirty-two nations were eventually involved. Twenty-eight of these constituted the Allied and Associated Powers, whose principal belligerents were the British Empire, France, Italy, Russia, Serbia, and the United States of America. They were opposed by the Central Powers: Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, Germany, and the Ottoman Empire.
The war began in the Balkan cockpit of competing nationalisms and ancient ethnic rivalries. Hopes that it could be contained there proved vain. Expansion of the war was swift. Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914; Germany declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany declared war on France on 3 August and invaded Belgium. France was invaded on 4 August. German violation of Belgian neutrality provided the British with a convenient excuse to enter the war on the side of France and Russia the same evening. Austria-Hungary declared war on Russia on 6 August. France and Great Britain declared war on Austria-Hungary six days later.
The underlying causes of these events have been intensively researched and debated. Modern scholars are less inclined to allocate blame for the outbreak of war......

...2083
The main cause of World War 1 that is sold is to the masses is the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria. We are told that he was the linchpin that was keeping Europe from breaking out into a monstrous war and that his assassination had a domino effect which eventually sparked World War 1. But to be brutally honest, it is not clever to narrow down the cause or rather causes of World War 1 simply to one event.
One must admit however that on paper, this reasoning does appear rather sound. On June 28, 1914, a group of conspirators from the revolutionary movement called Mlada Bosna (‘Young Bosnia’) carried out the assassination of the Austro-Hungarian heir namely, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife while they were visiting Sarajevo. By birth, the assassins were Serbs which resulted in Austria’s monarchy to blame Serbia. The event triggered the course of events that directly led to the outbreak of World War 1. But one has to remember, it did not directly cause it. Austria-Hungary just needed an excuse to attack and eliminate the ‘Serbian’ threat which they had wanted to do for quite some time and when the assassination occurred, they finally had one.
But to achieve a greater understanding of the reasons and causes of World War 1, one has to acquaint themselves with Europe’s situation in the late 1800s and the early 1900s. During these times, imperialism, militarism and nationalism were seen to be dominant factors that were driving the European nations......

...HIST 102
The Real Cause of War was Peace
What drives a country to war? This is a great question to ponder when thinking about history. Most of history revolves around wars. Most countries would prefer peace, but there are times when war is unavoidable. This was true for World War I, but why after this war ended did another world war break out only twenty years later. To understand this one must examine how the first war ended, and what happened between the end of World War I and the start of World War II around the world.
World War I was a long fought war between the Allied Powers—United States, Great Britain, France, Russia and Italy—and the Central Powers—Germany, Austro Hungary, Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria. The war began in 1914 and the United States entered the war in 1917. The war ended in 1919 with the Treaty of Versailles. When President Woodrow Wilson spoke about the war he stressed how important it would be to have peace without a victor and that the only peace that could last is “peace among equals” (A., H.J. Rebecca, 2012).
Peace among equals would mean that at the end of the war everyone was treated as equals with an equal say in the terms of peace. This is not how World War I ended. The Allied Powers were victorious and since England and France had fought so hard at such a great cost they wanted to punish the Central Powers and especially Germany. They imposed harsh sanctions on Germany and demanded they pay $33 billion in reparations. This......

...Causes of World War ll
After World War l, the world was trying to recover from the harsh effects of the war. In the 1920’s, twenty years after World War 1, the world was able to maintain world peace within. Everyone had the mindset of avoiding another war at all costs. Then ironically, in the 1930’s, new threats to the world peace arose, and another war seemed to be inevitable. No actions taken to stop the war from happening proved to be effective. A convergence of events contributed to the beginning of World War 11; including the failure of the League of Nations, Hitler’s actions, and the declaration of war on Germany by Great Britain and France.
The League of Nations proved to be ineffective, and failed to tale appropriate actions toward countries when problems arose.
a. The League of Nations basically allowed Japan to take Manchuria and other parts of China from China
i. Textbook p. 712 ( Japan blew up their own railroad and blamed China)
ii. Textbook p. 712 (The League of Nations failed to thoroughly investigate, and Japan got away with little chastisement)
iii. Textbook p.712 ( China lost Manchuria, Japan admitted to blowing up their own railroad, and the countries went to war with each other)
iv. Textbook p. 712 (Japan occupied ¼ of China)
b. The League of Nations didn’t take much action when Italy expanded to Ethiopia
i. Textbook p. 712 ( only placed economic sanctions on Italy)
ii. Textbook p. 712 (Mussolini still declared......

...Wyatt Rodriguez
9/30/15
1st period
World War One Causes
Various events took place in Europe, assassination, betrayal, alliances, and territorial disputes. Each of these events taking shape towards a war that would unite the world in a single fight. With the traits of nationalism, imperialism, militarism, and alliances being the motivators in the world wide war.
Throughout time there have always been alliances, with different races forming together for single causes. Hence Rudyard Kipling’s quote in 1905 “Oh East is East, and West is West… But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth, when two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of earth!” There was no exception in World War one, when Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia went to defend against the Austrians’ with Serbia. With Russia in the fight, Germany declared war upon Russia, eventually leading France into the war against Germany and Austria-Hungary. With Germanys’ attack on Belgium, it provoked the British and included them as well into the nationwide war. Japan later joined as well on the Allies side, and with the sinking of the Lusitania the United States, Britain, and Italy went into the war fully.
Imperialism was already enforced before the war, with most of Europe looking to take certain points within Asia and Africa. These points proved advantages and disadvantages to some of the warring countries. When the war was ready to commence the controlled......

...Democrat and Dictator
Fourteen years after the devastation of World War I, the American and German nations found themselves in a period of depression and disunity. Unemployment in the US had risen to nearly 25%, while nearly one-third of Germany’s worker’s was unemployed. In a time of crisis, both countries turned to new leadership in Franklin D. Roosevelt and Adolph Hitler in hopes of finding salvation to pull them out of their economic and mental depressions.
Looking at the terms of the depression in each country, each leader had wildly different views of the causes behind why they were put in such a terrible state. President Roosevelt believed the biggest cause of the problems the US faced was the corrupted rulers- in this case, the bankers. The United States was in a very concerned state of distress. “Primarily, this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated.” (Cite One) Instead of rectifying their actions, however, all of the major bankers and corporations in the US just offered to lend even more money instead, aiming to help themselves out more than the people they claimed to be helping. The corporations begged to be trusted again, but Roosevelt believed they assumed a position of false leadership.
Hitler, on the other hand, believed that there were two major causes behind the economic and moral depression in Germany: the effects......

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Pg
1
Causes
of
World
War
1
The
First
World
War
occurred
between
July
1914,
and
November
11,
1918.
The
official
starting
date
of
the
War
is
listed
as
the
4th
of
August
1914,
when
Britain
declared
war
on
Germany.
The
War
ended
with
Germany
signing
the
Treaty
of
Versailles,
a
peace
treaty
that
acknowledged
Germany
as
the
main
perpetrator
of
the
War.
The
end
of
the
War
would
see
over
seventeen
million
people
killed,
including
over
sixty-­‐two
thousand
Australian
soldiers.
The
main
reasons
as
to
why
war
erupted
is
a
very
complex
matter
much
more
complicated
than
just
a
simple
list
of
causes.
Although
there
was
a
chain
of
events
that
directly
and
inevitably
led
to
the
fighting
itself,
the
actual
original
causes
of
the
War
are
much
more
profound,
and
are
still
a
part
of
continued
debates
and
discussions
today.
The
First
World
War
saw
causes
such
......

...Prior to the beginning of World War I the attitude toward war was extremely positive. People were excited about the war and they greeted it with enthusiasm. In Europe they were told it was going to over by Christmas so people weren’t expecting it to be long nor brutal for that matter. The press romanticized the war with various propaganda; so many men enlisted and were very proud to serve. They viewed it as they were going to be heroes and a victory was on its way; and no men wanted to miss the action. War made people, men and women, feel very nationalistic for their country, thus making them eager to contribute as much as they could to the war effort. Some men felt war was going to be a “great adventure” and gave “the war an ideal and almost romantic character”. All of Europe also helped romanticized the war and heroism because the people no experience with a long bloody war, they didn’t know what to expect. Contributions other than enlisting in the war were numerous. They men and women wanted to help out with the war effort for their country because it made them feel proud and integrated with the war. Some people contributed with food rations and where they donated food to the soldiers. Others planted victory gardens and some women took over the jobs the men did. Women also joined the Red Cross to help out in the war. The wealthier people donated money to the war effort so they could contribute in a way. In that early stage of the war they didn’t know how bad, long and......

...The political causes of World War 2
World War 2, famously known as the most devastating war, had causes dating back to WWI as well as,pre . Some people refereed it because of the Treaty of Versailles which most of the people agreed one that it was too unfair for Germany and that their anger was going to appear sooner or later. The people thought it will create fascism. Some historians saw that the failure of The League of Nations was also another factor.
The Treaty of Versailles was the origin of all the problems that occurred to ignite the WWII. The treaty of Versailles was originally done to spread peace between countries and cool down the aggression that was spreading all over Europe. The treaty was believed to be an agreement between the winning sides of World War 1 powers. They were meeting up to decide what they were going to do with the losing allies of the war. They were mainly Germany and Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire. It was supposed to make Germany literally a neutral country because of all the power it was abusing which was beginning to affect the whole balance of power in Europe. The power that Germany was beginning to acquire was going to have a negative effect on all the European countries that had power and didn’t want it to be loosened at all. As with Germany rising to more and more powerful state, that would mean they would have to start powering up their armies which will cost them more money that they didn’t have at the......